Rubik
by Callista Miralni
Summary: As a trainee, a ghost girl gave Sasuke a lifeline in the form of a Rubik's cube. Two years later, he falls in love with the ultimate Rubik's cube: Haruno Sakura. For SasuSaku Month 2012. AU. Based on Korean drama "Dream High 2."


Rubik

Callista Miralni

Disclaimer: nothing! Not even the plot.

I've been catching up on my dramas and _Dream High 2_was playing the day I wrote this soo… the plot doesn't belong to me. Even with the small tweaks I made. :O If this does well, I might write a full length version but we'll see. I have so many other things to finish first!

I apologize for using the entertainment industry setting again but… it's so fascinating! I'm also using a similar format to _Sonata_ since it did so well last year.

The second of three one-shots I wrote for SasuSaku Month 2012. This one in particular was difficult to write and finish.

Prompt: Ghost

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_Track.01_falling_

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Whenever Sasuke got stressed, he picked up an old Rubik's cube and began to solve it.

He had it for years. Maybe that was an exaggeration, but it felt like it. Sasuke remembered how it came by him with crystal clear accuracy. He just received the phone call that his mother died. The funeral was in two days and he couldn't come home.

Suna Entertainment wouldn't allow him to leave.

Overcome with grief, Sasuke ran out into the Tokyo streets. He didn't get far from the studio when he finally collapsed on the staircase to the pedestrian bridge leading to Konoha Arts School. There he grieved quietly, knowing no one would see him.

It wasn't fair. His mother encouraged him to chase after his dreams, going so far as to sign him up for an audition to study at Konoha. When he failed that and returned home in near tears, she consoled him. Practice times were built into his schedule. Uchiha Mikoto continually searched for opportunities.

When he passed the audition for Suna, his mother was overjoyed.

"_Be all you can be, ne, Sasuke-chan?"_

Now she was gone. His father lost a battle to cancer two years before. Aside from his older brother, Sasuke was an orphan.

It just wasn't fair. Why does God have to take all the _good_ people in the world?

He wiped at his tears continuously and quieted his cries. He didn't even know why he bothered to in the first place—it wasn't as if anyone was around to witness his moment of weakness.

Sasuke was wrong.

Someone did see him. She quietly touched his shoulder with a Rubik's cube, saying, "Solve it. This always helps me when I'm upset."

Silently, Sasuke glanced at the toy. She must have sensed his hesitation because she pressed it into his hands. "Trust me. You'll be able to think clearer." The girl turned around, went back up the staircase, and never looked back.

To his surprise, the girl was right. With each twist, the cube replaced his earlier frustration with thoughts of how to solve the puzzle. Over the years, his closest friends joked about his obsession with Rubik's cubes, giving him several over the years. He solved them all but he could never solve the one she gave him. Sometimes, someone would ask him how his interest in the toys began. Sasuke never mentioned the girl.

She was like a ghost to him. He never saw her again and even if he did, he would not have been able to recall her face. Sasuke only remembered the pink jacket she wore.

Years later, he walked through the doors of Konoha Arts School with a bitter smile on his face.

_Look, Okaa-san. I'm a Konoha student after all._

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_Track.02_you're my star_

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The screaming girls clustered on the staircase did little to soothe his frayed nerves. Sai was missing yet _again_ but there was little he could do about that. If he wasn't careful, his bandmate will find himself in a hopeless situation.

A pair of arguing voices coming from one of the recording labs caught Sasuke's attention. The girl kept asking the boy to just listen to her song and help her arrange it. The boy refused before accusing her of submitting it as her own work to an audition.

Sasuke recognized the helpless and defeated look in her eyes. Before he realized fully what he was doing, he stepped inside the lab and offered to arrange it for her.

Her green eyes flickered with so many emotions in a few seconds. First, there was a fan's adoration (_he was THE Uchiha Sasuke of eDen after all_), surprise, disbelief, but gratitude shone the brightest.

"You're... you... you can help me?"

He smirked. "Sure. Give me your iPod."

The other boy scoffed and accused her of being another typical fan. "There's nothing great about him. He does a bunch of flashy moves and sings plagiarized songs. You trust him to arrange your music when he can't even understand the meaning of his own?"

She screamed his name. "Hozuki Suigetsu, you are the biggest jerk I've ever met!"

And clocked him in the jaw.

Her name was Haruno Sakura. She was average, musically-talented wise, but Sasuke could sense potential in her. She was one of his biggest fans and did little to conceal the fact. She wasn't stick thin like Karin, Ino, or Tayuya and her face had that annoying girl-next-door quality to it. She was smart but often said things without thinking. She had green eyes and pink hair.

The color pink made Sasuke pause. It was like the pink squares on his favorite Rubik's cube and the color of the phantom's jacket who gave him his last lifeline.

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_Track.03_hello to myself_

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Anko gave them a stern glance. Sasuke almost rolled his eyes at Suna's dance choreographer-turned-teacher but he knew that woman would be crazy enough to inflict some kind of sadistic punishment on him later.

"Today, we're going to be showing you how to cover someone. Kakashi-sensei has gladly offered his assistance for this demonstration."

Anko told him to bend his knees repeatedly. "Watch," she ordered the class before turning on "The DJ is Mine."

She danced fluidly around the English teacher, using him like a stage prop. Even Sasuke was impressed.

"We'll take the worst dancer," Anko pointed to Sakura, "and the best dancer."

Inuzuka Kiba moved forward, but Sasuke pulled him back with a smirk and sauntered to the front. Anko nodded in approval and motioned for Sakura to bend her knees.

She gave him a shy smile as the music started. It only took Sasuke a second to decide how to begin the dance.

When in doubt, Anko told him and Sai once, act out the song.

That's what he did. His male classmates whistled in appreciation at his expression of wanting a girlfriend and describing his perfect girl. His female classmates swooned when he looked Sakura in the eyes and mimicked the beating of his heart with his hand.

She continued to smile despite it all, biting on her lip whenever he got too close.

And when Taeyang sang about his dream girl showing off a picture of him on her cell phone, Sasuke chose to show them a picture of his arms wrapped around Sakura with a rare smile on his face. The girl in his arms momentarily stopped moving, only remembering to breathe again when she saw him dancing in front of her.

Anko told them to stop after the chorus. Nonchalant, Sasuke took his place at the back of the classroom again, but he dared a glance at his partner one last time before her crazy friend blocked his view.

Haruno Sakura may be the worst dancer of their class but that didn't mean she couldn't get better.

She just needed a decent dance partner.

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_Track.04_super star_

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Sasuke practiced in a dance room being temporarily used as storage with his iPod. He heard the door open but he ignored it.

Sakura walked in carrying a bucket of cleaning solution and a mop. She cleared her throat. "I have to clean this room."

Annoyed, Sasuke took out his headphones. "What?"

She gave him irritated glance in return. "Oh never mind," Sakura snapped as she began to clean the floor around the bench.

"You said you had to clean. Fine. Clean. I'm done practicing."

She rolled her eyes. "First, you act like you can't hear me but then it turns out you know exactly what I said. I hate annoying people like you."

And this girl calls herself his fan. Sasuke gave her one last glare before he pulled off his practice shoes. A fraying hole caught his eye and he sighed. Damn. He'll have to replace them soon if he kept up practicing like this.

Opening up his duffle bag, Sasuke was about to stuff his shoes inside and put on his regular sneakers when Sakura's pale hand suddenly reached into the bag. He jerked back his hand reflexively, pulling his shoes close and stared at her with paranoid eyes.

She scoffed at his expression and continued reaching inside his bag, pulling out his Rubik's cube. Sasuke was about to tell her to put it back and mind her own business when she said, "You haven't solved this? I can do it for you in a minute."

"Are you crazy, saying you can do it in a minute... why not thirty seconds?"

She studied the cube. "I've never tried for thirty seconds. Keep time if you want."

The cube lined up in her hands thirty seconds later. Sakura smiled in triumph before handing it back to him. Shocked, Sasuke turned the cube over and over in his hands. For some reason, he felt that something in his life changed, but Sasuke didn't know what.

"How the hell did you do that?"

Her patronizing smirk made him wish he never asked in the first place. "If you twist it around without any real intention of solving it, you'll never get anywhere. You have to _want_ to solve it before you can finish the puzzle."

He considered her words. "Is that why I've never been able to solve this one?"

"What? You've never solved it once in two years?"

Sasuke frowned. "How did you know I've had it for two years?"

Sakura looked away. "I was your fan. A fan would know you always carry that with you."

It sounded like an excuse. His fans knew he liked Rubik's cubes, but no one knew he had this one in his bag at all times. Not even Sai knew that and they shared a dressing room. He opened his mouth to accuse her of being the worst stalker in the world but Sakura picked up her cleaning supplies and walked out the didn't even finish cleaning the room.

A random thought struck him and he wondered if _she_ was his Rubik's cube ghost.

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_Track.05_painful hope_

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His labelmates left to go find Karin after she didn't show up to her own birthday party but Sasuke stayed behind at Konoha to prepare her cake. The rest of the junior class was out doing something or another—he didn't really care what they were up to.

The sound of someone playing the piano and singing in a nearby room startled him. He thought he was the only one here...

It was Sakura, practicing the composition he helped her arrange weeks before. Sasuke could hear the chords he added to the single note melody but the accompaniment was new.

New and beautiful.

She sang along the accompaniment, her voice cracking at some of the higher notes. After a while, she stopped and picked up a digital recorder sitting next to the music stand. Sighing, Sakura looked at the recorder.

"You better appreciate this, Suigetsu. I'm here practicing even though I've been banned from the practice rooms until my suspension is done. If I hear you say I'm dragging you down because I haven't practiced, I swear to God I will punch you in the face again."

She stopped the recorder and put it back on the stand. Looking up, she saw Sasuke standing at the door.

"How- how long have you been standing there?"

"Long enough to hear you sing."

Sakura looked mortified. She made a move to get up and leave but Sasuke sat her down with a command to stay as he took a seat on a small table.

"You have an honest voice."

She frowned. "An honest voice is not the same as a practiced voice."

"I want to hear that song again."

"Why?"

Sasuke was silent for a moment before he shrugged and offered her a slight smirk. "Because a honest song should be sung by a honest voice."

Her fingers moved gracefully over the keys. If Sakura couldn't make it as a singer, she'd definitely have a shot as a pianist.

She sang the song again for him. Content, Sasuke leaned against the wall and let the words sink in. Somehow, he felt like this girl understood him better than anyone else. Her song reminded him of his darkest days and the Rubik's cube that offered him hope.

When she finished performing, she looked at him, scared of his reaction. He gave her a rare, sincere smile and clapped his hands.

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_Track.06_together_

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The sound of falling objects distracted Sasuke from his mindless humming. Something red rolled his way—an apple—and he picked it up off the ground.

Sakura stood in front of him, gaping at her locker that was once stuffed with the scattered apples surrounding her. Picking up the apples with tears in her eyes, she didn't see him until he held up the apple in his hand.

"Sasuke?"

He knelt in front of her and brushed the tears off her cheeks. Using his thumbs, he forced her lips into a smile. She slapped his hand away and held out a hand.

"Thank you for picking it up. I'll take that back now," Sakura said in a hoarse voice.

He smirked and took a bite out of the apple. "You know," he mused. "I don't understand why women think they look pretty when they cry. You look terrible."

Gaping at him as he ate, Sakura couldn't seem to find words to respond to his comment. Instead, she held out her hand again. "Sasuke, I don't think you should be eating that. There's probably something wrong with it or something—I mean, why else would they all be back in my locker? If you value your reputation, you'll stop eating that apple. Your luck will turn bad and you shouldn't walk in front of mirrors during the new moon. Sasuke, I'm serious, _stop eating that apple!_"

The Uchiha boy shrugged. "Can I have the rest?"

"Have you been dropped on your head or something?"

"No," he answered shortly. "My mom raised me to accept gifts when given, no matter how much you don't want them."

It didn't occur to Sasuke that it was the wrong thing to say until Sakura's shoulders slumped in defeat and fresh tears gathered in the corner of her eyes.

"I really should take that apple back from you."

"That's not what I meant."

"It was stupid of me to burden everyone with a gift like that."

Sasuke blurted out. "I'll take them."

She didn't seem to understand what he meant.

"Sakura, I'm selfishly asking you to gift me those apples," he said with a touch of exasperation.

Shocked, Sakura robotically placed the apples in an empty box and handed it to him. He bowed in thanks and walked back to his dorm room.

Karin caught him by the arm as he walked by her sulking in the hallway. "Sasuke, you cannot be serious about a girl as cheap as her."

He shrugged off her hold. "So what if I am?"

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_Track.07_we are the b_

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Sakura stood on the stage, talking to herself while intermittently crying and laughing at her foolishness. High in the shadows, Sasuke watched her.

This girl can't be serious. After composing and drastically _improving_ upon a half-hearted arrangement done by someone else, she's leaving?

"I never thought about being anything else other than a singer," Sakura confessed to the empty stage. "And to think, the only time I'll stand on stage is to announce that I'm leaving it."

Her words struck a chord in him. Years ago, after he failed his entrance audition to Konoha, he remembered saying the same thing to Jiraiya-sensei.

He ran back to his room. Opening up a rarely used music composition notebook, he scribbled down the notes to her song, adding in instruments, and occasionally playing what he wrote on the keyboard.

After three hours, Sasuke penciled in one last rest, and smiled in satisfaction. He stood up and closed the notebook before heading out his room and knocking on the door down the hall.

Karin opened the door. "Sasuke, what are you doing here?"

He ignored her question. "Where's Sakura?"

His labelmate made a sour face. "Gone. Why are you looking for her?"

"None of your business."

Sasuke turned to leave, intending to look for that Suigetsu kid she hung around with sometimes, but Karin seized the notebook under his arm and opened it. Glancing at the title and the credits line, she glared at him.

"What is so special about her that's even got _you_ writing songs for her?" Karin yelled. "She's nothing! Low-class and sub-standard for someone like you, Uchiha Sasuke!"

Sasuke tugged the notebook out of her hands. "Where is she, Karin?"

"It doesn't matter," the new girl—was Temari her name?—said from the top bunk. "Sakura left because of Karin and every other dickhead in this school. She's never coming back."

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_Track.08_day by day_

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Suigetsu watched the retreating cab with a rueful expression before turning around and coming face to face with Sasuke.

"Where did she go?"

"She's gone, Uchiha," Suigetsu snapped. "And it's all my fault."

"Well if you would stop criticizing her all the time and _encourage_ her instead, she wouldn't be leaving."

"What the hell would you know, pretty boy?" Suigetsu snarled as he pinned him to the wall. "I know that it's my fault she left because I say things without thinking and make her feel like shit. And I can't apologize to her because my _pride_ stops me."

"You're pathetic." Sasuke pushed Suigetsu off him. "Shouldn't you be saying that to her instead of me? Why don't you bring her back so you can tell her yourself?"

"I've got a question for you." Suigetsu looked at him with narrowed eyes. "Why do you need to know all of her business? She's just a classmate, so why care at all? Do you like her or something? Someone like Haruno Sakura should be out of your notice; shouldn't you be cozying up to one of your gorgeous labelmates or someone like that and spin the media love story of the decade?"

His last comment touched a nerve. Sasuke glared. "So what if I do like her?" He retorted. "Who I choose to spend my time with or care about is none of your concern. It makes you sound petty when you mention it."

He left Suigetsu standing there in disbelief. It wasn't until he reached the school doors that Sasuke heard him yell, "Where are you going?"

Sasuke paused and glanced over his shoulder.

"To bring her back."

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_Track.09_new dreaming_

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The chapel doors blocked out all outside noise. Sasuke found her sitting in the back pews.

"You know, I'm just happy that someone acknowledged my music. That's enough for me," Sakura said quietly.

"So come back to Konoha."

She smiled and shook her head. "I need to stay home and help raise my sister. She's young and needs female guidance since our mother is dead."

"You're just going to give up on your dream. All that potential-"

"Nothing is going to change my mind, Sasuke," Sakura interrupted. "I'm touched that you came all this way to convince me otherwise."

He regarded her in disbelief. "I like you," he blurted out.

She scoffed. "You think I'm the gullible kind of girl who falls to pieces when her idol tells her he likes her? Don't be stupid and think I'll buy into your lies."

One honest statement from him and she treats it like a joke. He spotted a goblet sitting on a table ahead. Getting up, he saw the pitcher full of some kind of liquid sitting beside it. Pouring a glass, Sasuke held it up for her to see. Apparently, it meant something to her because Sakura stood up suddenly.

"Wait, don't drink that! It's wine used for-"

Sasuke drained the glass.

"-Holy Communion," she finished her sentence weakly.

He never had alcohol before and drinking the wine so fast disoriented his senses and made him sleepy. Sasuke struggled to keep his balance before he crashed into Haruno. She lay him down on the pew with his head in her lap and shook her head.

"You should probably sleep it off," Sakura advised. "I'll keep you company."

"I like you," Sasuke repeated.

"You don't know what you're saying. Shut up and sleep."

"I really like you, Sakura. You're like my Rubik's cube when I can't figure out anything."

"Now you're being stupid."

"Come back to Konoha."

She hushed him again and forced him to sleep.

An hour later, Sasuke heard music. Sakura was sleeping above him, a headphone in one ear, the other in Sasuke's. He sat up and glanced at her iPod. The music player switched to a song he knew very well.

He couldn't help himself from singing along. The empty chapel had the best acoustics Sasuke ever heard.

Sakura's head fell on his shoulder. She woke up from the sudden pull of gravity and realized Sasuke was awake and singing...

… _to her._

She never moved her head from his shoulder, just sat and listened in silence.

"_Even if I can't sing, if I get a different job, will you still love me for who I am?_"

When the song ended, Sasuke looked down and smiled faintly.

"Let's go."

Sakura accepted his outstretched hand and they left the chapel in silence.

Sasuke knew she didn't believe his confession. Haruno Sakura wouldn't allow herself to hope it was true after having her biggest dream trampled upon. Before she'd believe him, she needed to fix herself first.

In many ways, she was like a Rubix's cube. One had to sort through all her insecurities and quirks to uncover her amazing heart. Sasuke was only just starting to solve the puzzle that was Haruno Sakura.

_You have to want to solve the puzzle before you can finish it._

Uchiha Sasuke wanted Haruno Sakura more than anything. As he helped her put the pieces of her life back together, the girl he uncovered was more amazing than the scattered shell he started with.

"_I like you, Sakura. You're like my Rubik's cube when I can't figure out anything_."

One day, she'd believe him.


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